


The Ash and Gwyn Interludes

by not_poignant



Series: The Fae Tales Verse - canon extras [8]
Category: Fae Tales - not_poignant, Original - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Dark, Disturbing Themes, Flashbacks, Friendship, Nonhuman Characters, PTSD, Politics, Trust Issues, Unseelie Court, When Two Polymaths Collide
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-02
Updated: 2018-01-03
Packaged: 2019-01-08 04:20:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12246879
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/not_poignant/pseuds/not_poignant
Summary: Interactions between Ash and Gwyn are strained at best in the Unseelie Court, and they both have their own reasons for it. Though Ash always knows that he screwed up, and Gwyn knows it too.(Part of the widerFae Tales universeand won't make sense as a standalone).





	1. Things Are Fine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The rating is likely to change in future chapters, as are the tags. Fair warning, the inside of Ash's head is a complete clusterfuck. Also, these interstitials will all likely occur between _The Court of Five Thrones_ and _The Ice Plague._

_Ash_

*

Ash’s hand came up to rub at his chin as he watched Gwyn training in the arena with Gulvi. It had been Gulvi’s idea, that Ash watch them. She used to talk about it, how they’d spar together. In Ash’s mind, it was connected with the story of Gulvi and Gwyn’s first meeting – the now-King almost destroying her on a battlefield, and then lending her a hand when the Unseelie surrender was formally called. Something like that. At the time, Ash had only been furious that Gulvi had come so close to death, was so reckless with herself.

That was one of the few times he realised that he could lose her. He wouldn’t even know when she died, no one would tell him probably. Maybe one of her apprentices. Maybe they’d tell him.

Throughout their friendship, her recklessness had been in part why he was convinced of her utter invincibility. She was like the eye of a storm, the stillness inside the chaos, needing it, finding it steadying. He found it exhilarating to be near her. Endless years of stories, and he knew she’d not even begun to share most of them. Hearing of all the times she’d played and flirted and frisked about with death, and instead, the years went by and he became certain she’d somehow live forever.

Then the night she’d come to him and told him that story of Gwyn ap Nudd, who Ash knew by reputation, and in a way…proximity. The An Fnwy estate close enough to his older brother’s lake – their family home no longer – that Ash knew what the hooves of hunting horses sounded like when that family wanted to destroy something in the Ethallas forest. Beast or fae. It didn’t much matter.

Gulvi’s eyes had practically glowed with excitement as she talked of how close she’d been to death. The closest she’d ever been, since her initiation, apparently. She saw the promise of her death in Gwyn’s eyes, and now she had a friend out of it! Ash knew he was meant to laugh at the right cues, but instead he’d told her to stay out of warfare. She obviously wasn’t made for it.

They’d fought a bit, and that was that. Ash didn’t find it an endearing story.

Why should he?

Now, he watched them spar. In the Unseelie Court. Because he lived here now.

That was normal, wasn’t it?

Attached to the words ‘Unseelie Court,’ the fact that he’d lived here before with Augus. What a time that’d been. How odd that it was _better_ now. Despite the fact that he’d nearly ruined it. _Tried_ to ruin it. Could still smell flesh burning if he thought about it too much and actually if he hardly thought about it at all. Had nightmares of it not just being Gwyn, but everyone. All of them. Augus, with bits of flesh melting off his body, tears streaming down his face, and just asking why. Over and over. Good dreams. The best.

Ash’s therapist in the human world said it was post-trauma, or something, and that made him laugh, because he’d given it to himself. Sometimes when he moseyed through the night gardens, away from everyone else, telling himself he didn’t need a drink he’d never _needed_ it and he certainly didn’t need it now, he’d wonder why he did it all. He didn’t even really know. All his reasons were so stupid. He couldn’t trust himself.

That had started a long time ago. Long before he’d ever talked with Ifir about untrustworthy rulers, sitting there over a drink and his glamour cranked up to a hundred and saying:

‘I lived with _Augus_ in this Court, Ifir. Come on, man, you think I don’t know what I see? And Augus made it easy, he was _obviously_ fucking things up - my own brother. You think I don’t know how to ante up and make a really tough call when I need to?’

Ifir drinking it in, his raw fire going honey warm in the face of Ash’s glamour, and then…mutiny.

There was blood in the arena. Gulvi had sliced Gwyn twice across his forearm. The arm that was permanently injured. Ash had figured that out for himself. Seen the tells. Everyone else seemed unaware, but the way Gwyn moved…because it either went one of two ways – Gwyn either presented the shoulder like it never hurt and he was totally unaware of it. Or he moved like his entire body was pulled towards it. Didn’t anyone else see how he sometimes stood with that shoulder towards the wall more than the other? Or how he’d angle it away? Even, sometimes, in the reluctance to turn his head as freely one way than the other.

It wasn’t all the time. Gwyn obviously knew to hide it. But either the pain was too bad sometimes, or…

And that was why Gulvi had gotten the cuts on that forearm. Gwyn had retaliated. Something with a sword. Whatever. He moved too fast for Ash to keep track. He’d thought Augus had been kickass with the rapier – and he _was_ – but this was different. Impressive. That force that made Ash terrified for Gulvi’s life, and then Augus’. Everyone’s even. For a while there, he’d remembered the Nightingale, and just figured Gwyn had to be worse somehow. Didn’t he have to be? Hadn’t he captured Augus and hid him in a cell for six months? Ash had been there at the Display. He’d been there. Drugged to high heaven and he’d only had hazy memories later of Augus as a _waterhorse,_ quelled, tamed, hurting, alone.

His therapist had asked him to keep a journal, and he’d written one line in it before he gave it up.

_I am super good at being super delusional._

And then she’d tell him that he should get upset about things. That his pain was real pain. His fear was real fear. Even if he’d generated it himself. And sometimes he wanted to tell her that if she was younger, and he was hungrier, he might’ve eaten her. He might’ve lulled her with his glamour and lured her back to his poorly kept lake – because of course he still had his childhood lake while Augus lost everything he’d ever known – and sunk his teeth into her neck and in waterhorse form felt a glee and bliss and hunger that was like nothing else. Not even like multiple orgasms or the purest MDMA. Not even both of those things rolled up together, weeks on end.

One person. One hunt.

He didn’t tell her. He liked her. So he liked to tell himself that he would’ve never done that to her. No. Of course not. He only ate the people who were down on their luck.

The people who probably needed real, tangible help. The ones who were at the end of it all, and Ash delivered death to them, not salvation.  

It didn’t matter anymore. His hunger was the worst it had ever been, since the Nightingale. He didn’t know if it was those underworld creatures inside of him – he’d not even really noticed them at the time. The Nightingale. Feeding off of all the fae around him. Eating their grief and misery and causing more. Once, in a dark corridor, the Nightingale had placed a tender gloved hand on Ash’s shoulder and said:

‘You are terribly generous.’

‘Why?’ Ash had said. Fear knocking in his heart. Why? Because his brother was here and the Nightingale had it up in his twisted brain that Ash had somehow given Augus to him? Because Ash couldn’t get Augus away? Because Ash couldn’t do a fucking thing to save him? Because he just had to…he just had to _be there_ and know what was happening? Augus not listening to him, and the circles under his eyes and the weakness as he spread his poison in the fae realm trying to destroy everything like he was being destroyed?

See what happened, when you poisoned one of the world’s strongest waterhorses? No wonder the fresh water systems were disabled at Augus’ touch. It was all falling apart.

Ash had generously provided it, in his inability to do a thing about it.

‘You feel things very strongly,’ the Nightingale had said, and then smiled. It was- It would have been better if it was a cold and lifeless expression, but it wasn’t. It was warm and sweet. Ash wanted to dig his blunt fingernails – why, _why_ didn’t he keep his claws sharp? – and tear his face off. He wanted to sink his stupid blunt teeth into the Nightingale’s neck. He wanted to punch his fist into his ribcage and touch his heart, stick his fingers down the aorta and tear it apart from the inside.

He even knew what that felt like. Though only in waterhorse form.

‘But you don’t feel things strongly enough to save him, do you?’ the Nightingale said. ‘Perhaps you understand that he is supposed to be my servant. And you, too. You haven’t left yet. Do you fancy you can protect him from what has already happened?’

Ash was never going to let Augus down again. Ever.

He would die before that happened.

But he’d never died. Only let down Augus again and again. Every time Augus vanished, walking beside the Nightingale, and came back and looked worse. When Ash had negotiated with Gwyn in desperation. When he’d been unable to save Augus from captivity, and then been unable to make anything good of the Unseelie Court, so that Augus had come back and looked around like he was being tortured all over again.

Not when he’d found a home for Augus and Augus hadn’t wanted it. Not when he’d assumed Gwyn had been raping him, over and over again. Not when he’d talked Augus into the Soulbond that only Ash thought was a good idea.

Then, not even when he’d tried to get Augus away from Gwyn.

His therapist said he should ask people what they wanted, before acting sometimes, but it hurt to contemplate. Years and years before, and Augus the King, and Ash by his side and taking one of his shaking hands and staring into glittery dull green deadness and saying:

‘Augus, what do you need? What can I do? Please, you know I’d-’

‘Nothing.’ His brother looking at him like he’d never need something from Ash ever again. Not even his love. It was like looking at a corpse.

‘Anything,’ Ash said, smiling weakly. ‘Anything at all.’

‘Nothing,’ Augus said.

It was one of their better exchanges.

Then, later, to Gulvi:

‘What can I do?’

‘Can you bring my fucking family back? Murder that misbegotten piece of _shit_ that you still dare to love after what he did to me?’

Also one of his better exchanges with Gulvi, once her family were confirmed dead. Amazing really that they had anything of a friendship now.

He could see how he’d ended up on the path he’d been on, but hated that for him, it had meant getting people killed and hurt. Being utterly wrong. _Super delusional._ Other people who were hurting just drank a lot and maybe got themselves into debt. Amazingly, they didn’t indirectly murder people. Other people who were hurting would listen to a lot of sad music, or maybe pour themselves into poetry or art.

Ash abused an abuse victim.

The Nain Rouge had once put her finger on something inside of him, and Ash had laughed it off, but he’d realised since that he should’ve trusted her to know what she was talking about.

‘There are musician’s musicians,’ she’d said, in one of her uncommonly sombre moods. ‘There are artists beloved by artists. There are fucking Pokemon Masters who make other Pokemon Masters look like newbies. That’s mostly about stats and Pokerus. There are sculptors every sculptor wants to be. Gunslingers that other gunslingers look up to. And you’re like me, bitty baby pony. You’re a monster’s monster. You think the fae don’t know how dark you are? Even though you hide it? Why do you think you’re beloved by the _Unseelie_ for fuck’s sake? That’s called overcompensation, honeycrunch. You’re all rolled up into a sweet little package of candy. People crave you, but you’ll still give them a disease once they’re done.’

At the time, he’d laughed, called it ‘high praise’ and she’d nodded like it was and then gone off to do something like hide in the shadows or crawl like a spider on the ceiling or whatever else she did because she was creepy and weird and he kind of adored her. He couldn’t even explain it. He knew she was dangerous as fuck, but she didn’t seem to want his power, not after he’d offered it, anyway.

‘I have too much dra’ocht, want some?’

‘Fuck that noise,’ she’d said, walking off with her nose wrinkled in disgust.

_A monster’s monster._

Put him in an Unseelie Court full of them, and he’d still ruin it. Like the Nightingale. He couldn’t even say it was like Augus, because Augus at least had a reason for it. Ash just got a whole bunch of mistakes into his head, and then ran off half-cocked, and treated everyone like they were stupid, and…

He missed Augus’ lake. Their home. Ethallas. Even the times when his stomach had hurt and he’d chewed at the inner layers of bark and Augus had watched him with sunken eyes and Ash had tried to give him the rest of the food over and over, and Augus had insisted that Ash eat it, first with gentle words, and then finally with a snapping, brutal force.

But he missed it. He’d crawl into Augus’ lap and they’d lie beneath blankets – some they’d stolen, some Augus had made – and he’d sleep listening to the sounds of Augus’ anxious stomach, the slow beat of his heart. Tired fingers in his hair, tousling it, holding him so tightly.

‘Can’t go back, can’t go forward,’ he muttered to himself.

Gulvi was using her wings now, off the ground and beating so fiercely that sawdust was going everywhere. She got Gwyn two steps backwards before he simply leapt into the air and grabbed a handful of pinion feathers, swinging her down to the ground.

Ash didn’t even tense.

He knew who the truly untrustworthy people were now.

An hour later it was over. Both Gulvi and Gwyn bloodied but neither seriously injured, and both of them heading over. He knew Gwyn wasn’t chatting like he normally would. Caught the way Gwyn’s eyes passed cautiously over Ash’s face. Once, then again, like he was waiting for Ash to jeer at him somehow.

Ash simply nodded in greeting. He’d kept his dra’ocht down in the arena. It felt like taking a big breath and holding it for too long, and it ached the longer he did it, but he was getting used to the sensation, and besides, if he wanted to live in a reality where he didn’t have to do it, maybe he shouldn’t’ve tortured the King in the first place.

Gwyn didn’t even ask. Wouldn’t. Wore so much, so visibly, once Ash knew to look for it. Maybe Gwyn didn’t notice that Ash did it, but Ash would never use his dra’ocht around Gwyn again. Unless Gwyn commanded it, or unless it was in the throne-room, which was different. That was Ash’s _job._

‘Good session,’ Gwyn said to Gulvi, his voice clipped, though he wasn’t out of breath anymore. In the time it’d taken them to walk across the arena, he was fine again. He could’ve sparred again. They could’ve fought for hours more.

‘You’re getting lazy,’ Gulvi said.

‘I only respond to what you give me,’ Gwyn said, shrugging one shoulder and smiling to himself, as he walked away from them both.

Ash watched him go, feeling some kind of wistfulness or yearning or just…maybe it was just the same stupid self-pity he always felt. Nothing wistful at all. He forced himself to face Gulvi, knew that she’d seen his discomfort. It didn’t matter, she also knew when he didn’t want to talk about it.

‘Lunch?’ he said.

He was hungry for more than bread and fruit and cheese. He wanted blood in the back of his throat and screams ringing in his ears and water all around him. He wanted his sharper teeth and the sense that he could tear a person apart in seconds. Wanted his waterhorse ears pushed forward with excitement and the glowing hazel that lit the deep lake before him, so he could see the last moments of a person’s terror.

He sickened himself. Three thousand years, and he still didn’t know how to deal with it.

Maybe he’d never know.

Maybe his heartsong was just denial or delusion, and Augus didn’t have the heart to tell him.

‘Ash?’ Gulvi said. She paused in the process of towelling blood off her body.

‘Just wallowing,’ Ash said, grinning and forcing himself to stand. ‘You know how good I am at that. What do you fancy today? You want to eat in? Or should we get the hell out of here and go to some café or something? Winterwest had a restaurant open and I’m pretty sure you’ll adore it. Plus, my shout. I mean I don’t have to pay, I helped out with the wine list and all that. So y’know, I’ll get lunch this time, and the next time we get charged for food, you can cover it.’

‘Mm, a restaurant while I’m covered in blood and reeking of sweat. Will they seat us? Never mind, darling, I’m sure they’ll make an exception for an ex-King and Queen.’

She held out her hand, and Ash slid his palm into hers, feeling the wall between them even as he could touch her skin. He could feel the warmth of her, the heat of her blood, and knew that things between them wouldn’t ever be the same again. He’d dared to keep loving his brother, after Augus had killed her family. He’d tried to get one of her other friends killed out of petty desperation.

He’d never been gladder that she had Fenwrel. Even Gwyn, really. They had a good friendship.

Maybe once, he would’ve told her everything he was thinking. But he knew now, that there was just a lot of fucking poison in him – a monster’s monster – and it was best if he just kept his bullshit delusions to himself. He only had to tell his therapist enough that he could stay level and be there for others. If they wanted him. The rest of the time, no one suffered when he kept shit to himself, and it worked out.

Because on the outside, if he took himself out of the equation, things were going just fine.


	2. Debt

_Gwyn_

*

It was rare for Ash to request a private meeting with Gwyn. Generally, the only real encounters they had with each other were in the fortnightly Inner Court meetings, where everyone reported on what was happening. Any encounters they had outside of that were usually when Ash was spending time with Gulvi or Augus, and he tended to disappear pretty quickly once Gwyn turned up.

Gwyn preferred it that way. Ash seemed happier managing the Winter Court, and he did an exemplary job of that and handling the general ambience in the throne room, but beyond that, Gwyn felt at odds around him.

Now, Gwyn waited in the meeting room where he typically saw all of the Inner Court. The large board hung behind him, where they tracked their funding, their campaigns, their allies, their enemies. He thought of Augus, out on a diplomatic assignment, and wondered when it would stop irking him to let Augus leave the safety of the palace or his lake. Augus could go on about how Gwyn was too controlling, and how Augus needed to prove himself, but all Gwyn could think of was the feel of Augus’ innards on his fingers, and Fenwrel giving some of her life-force to save his life.

In truth, he could do with a distraction.

A knock on the door, and then it opened and Ash poked his head in. He held some folders in one hand, met Gwyn’s eyes, offered a smile that was charming and nervous at the same time.

‘Hey, this meeting still good to go?’

‘I’m here, aren’t I?’ Gwyn said, staring at him.

‘Yep. Cool.’ Ash walked in, closed the door behind him, and Gwyn thought back to a time when he’d been here in the Unseelie Court and Ash had been King, and threatened him with compulsions.

Ash sat not next to Gwyn, but one seat away from him. Gwyn couldn’t feel his dra’ocht at all. For some time now, he knew Ash took pains to keep it away from Gwyn unless necessary. Gwyn couldn’t tell if he appreciated it, or disliked that Ash felt the need to make those kinds of concessions around him. Gwyn was impressed with Ash’s skill with his glamour and how it could be used in the Unseelie Court, it wasn’t like he was against it. He just didn’t like when it was being used as a weapon against him.

‘So, ah, okay I’ll get to the point,’ Ash said, rubbing at his damp, curly hair briefly. He laid out the folders. ‘Thursday has knocked me back on a requisition, because of the expense.’

‘Thursday is astute when it comes to managing our treasury,’ Gwyn said, leaning back in his chair. ‘You’re going over his head? I trust his judgement.’

‘Me too,’ Ash said quickly. ‘I do as well. But he wouldn’t listen to the background and told me to talk to you and I just need… It’s like, hard to describe? I just want to see what you think. If you say no, then cool, I’ll drop it. But I don’t normally requisition shit that’s expensive, or really – much at all – aside from stuff to keep the Winter Court going? I have private income, I think I can do this myself, I just think it should come from the Unseelie Court.’

‘What should?’

‘Munaciello – you know him, right?’

‘Drunk fellow,’ Gwyn said, smiling a little. ‘The monk? Dresses in red? I don’t believe he’s had a glass of water his entire life.’

‘Suckled on the teat of church wine or something, that’s him,’ Ash said. ‘Normally, he just drinks whatever’s there. He’s easy to keep pleased. As long as the kegs don’t run dry, and you know we have some of the ones that don’t. But recently he’s…started knocking the quality of the booze in the Winter Court. I mean he started a few months ago. I smoothed it with glamour at first, thinking that he was just getting greedy, because you know, that’s a thing, but it kept on going and it just seemed, like, almost malicious? Which isn’t really like him.

‘Then I thought maybe he just missed something of a better quality. You do sometimes. So I brought a bottle to share with him, and it’s not like you can get him drunk to spill his secrets, he’s the most functional alcoholic in the realm, and that’s saying something.’

Gwyn gestured for Ash to keep going.

‘Eventually, Munaciello reveals that he’s indebted to the linchetti. We don’t see many of them in the Winter Court, but I thought I’d go check it out. So he tells me that he promised the linchetti treasure, but at the moment he led them to the treasure, Macieh showed another fae the same treasure, and so it was…one of those things. Macieh said he saw it first, the linchetti insisted on another treasure of equal value, because they didn’t want to get into a bitch-fight with Macieh, and Munaciello’s been leading people to treasure all his life, he said he was beginning to come up dry.

‘So, like, none of this has anything to do with why he keeps requesting really expensive liquor, right? And over the next few weeks, I get bits and pieces of the story. Firstly, he can’t find more treasure for the linchetti – that’s a lie, I know it’s a fucking lie, but for some reason he doesn’t want to give it to them. Then he reveals that he’s under a curse to not be able to find treasure, but that’s his _power,_ and…I know it’s not the whole truth. Fucking- So _then_ he reveals that he’s cursed to not feel drunk anymore by the linchetti. Following me?’

‘So far,’ Gwyn said, thinking that he was endlessly grateful he didn’t have to live this kind of gossip, day in and day out. How _tedious._

‘A week later, he reveals that the linchetti cursed him because he hangs out in the Winter Court. Like, okay, weird but…what? But Munaciello only ever tells me like a little bit, and then wanders off? I just can’t… _make_ him. And I’m not gonna use my compulsions on him. I figured he was telling me in his own damned time. While slagging off the booze we have. To everyone. Which means suddenly I have a bunch of folks telling me they want gorzalka from the Mountains of Orban, or demanding usqebeaghe from the purest waters of Lough Derg made by a fae who died like, five thousand years ago. _Five thousand years ago._ So, okay, I start using my glamour, because it’s getting ridiculous. But no one’s listening? Which is not normal. My glamour isn’t weak? It’s worked on them before? Especially if they start getting all…fighty.’

_Fighty._ Gwyn stared at him.

‘Y’know?’ Ash said.

‘I can see why Thursday didn’t listen to this story,’ Gwyn said.

Ash didn’t look offended, he laughed. The sound was bright, cheerful, rough. Gwyn ached to hear it. The laugh wasn’t even mean, it just wasn’t what he’d expected. How did Ash do that so easily?

‘Seriously,’ Ash said in fervent agreement, looking at his folders. ‘So I can stop other things happening - like fisticuffs - with my glamour but for some reason, I can’t touch this shit about like, ‘hey, we want more expensive crap why isn’t the Unseelie Court putting out they don’t care about us.’ It’s a problem, it doesn’t take much to shake them. Everything we have here is tenuous, and some of those assholes out there want to destabilise the Court from the inside. Not that I’m familiar with that or anything as a theme, right? Hilarious. I can see it from a mile away. So y’know, I smooth the wrinkles and things don’t disintegrate into shit. Mostly.

‘Except this whole thing with like, all these fae coming to me, and Munaciello talking about this weird story with the linchetti and this curse, and so, a few days ago, Munaciello comes to me – not drunk, apparently – and he tells me what’s really going on. The linchetti have been plaguing Geroid – of Lough Gur – for a long time, feeding off his nightmares. Cuz, y’know, he mostly sleeps in his underwater kingdom and only appears once every seven years on his white horse and etcetera. It was a major source of their lifeforce.

‘Enter Augus,’ Ash said, pressing the back of his hand to his forehead, and frowning. ‘Augus destroyed Lough Gur, and Geroid…’

‘…I slaughtered him,’ Gwyn said abruptly, his eyes widening. ‘I remember. He was too sick from the desecration of his home. He came to the Seelie Court asking for asylum, but began hallucinating, and then- We couldn’t anchor him to a new place.’

Gwyn’s chest felt tight. He remembered it too well. The look of desperation in that Unseelie fae’s eyes, but the refusal to beg for an end. He hadn’t gone to his death with acceptance, he’d fought every second of it, aware of the unfairness right up until Gwyn’s arms and face were covered in blood and his sword was soaked and dripping gore.

‘He went berserk in the throne room,’ Gwyn said.

‘Yeah,’ Ash said. ‘No one really knew the linchetti were feeding off him. And some of the linchetti died too. Which meant that- I don’t really know how this works, but…the debt that Augus kind of owed Geroid, transferred to the linchetti. Or something? I don’t really know how that works exactly. Except-’

‘Why are the linchetti demanding reparation from Munaciello?’ Gwyn said abruptly, realising what had happened.

Ash paused, looking at Gwyn for a long moment, forehead creased.

‘So Munaciello has a thing for paying off Augus’ debts. He leads fae to treasure, who’ve been hurt or harmed, and Munaciello gets like, this gratitude, he gets their good will or whatever, and then he also gets the option to – if he wants – go to Augus and say, ‘hey guess what I’ve been doing for you?’ Because apparently that’s how it _works?_ Look is that- Is that how it works?’

‘Not- It can be,’ Gwyn said, groaning softly. ‘It’s not _supposed_ to work that way. But if anyone _acknowledges_ the debt, then it activates. So the linchetti demanded treasure, didn’t get it, cursed Munaciello into sobriety until he obtained liquor that might recoup their costs?’

‘No, it’s worse than that,’ Ash said, laughing. ‘Augus was fucking rich once. He had some of the best liquor _in the world,_ and he never drank it, did he? Some of it he let me get at, but some of it he kept because he knew he could buy palaces with a single bottle of Goibniu’s best.’

Gwyn was shocked. ‘He had that? Goibniu was a client of his?’

‘I don’t know,’ Ash said. ‘Who knows? Like he’d tell me. But what I know is that the linchetti want to get their hands on _Augus’_ stash, because it would make them phenomenally rich. Everything _Munaciello_ asks for, is what Augus had. I suppose he thinks because I’m his brother and obviously everyone is generally scared shitless of Augus, he figured I could wrangle it. But none of it- I have no idea where any of it went. It’s gone now. With his home. Augus can’t pay the price, and he doesn’t even know he has to pay it. But that’s why my glamour isn’t working, because I can’t make it seem like the debt isn’t there. And now the Winter Court is like, unknowingly acting on behalf of this debt that y’know - so Augus killed Geroid, it affected the linchetti, they would’ve accepted the treasure, but Macieh saw it first, and so now it’s this.’

Ash rubbed rapidly at his face, as though waking himself up.

‘I requested funds to find some of the booze,’ Ash said. ‘To maybe pay the debt. I don’t know if I can do it all on my own. I have access to some stuff, some favours I can call, but Thursday got as far as hearing that it was connected to Augus, and he told me to piss off. Nicely. But he still told me to piss off. You know how he feels about Augus.’

‘Fuck,’ Gwyn said softly. He caught the startled way Ash stared at him, but Gwyn was too busy thinking through the rabbit warren of it. Fae debt was such a strange magic, but it was especially complicated amongst the Unseelie. Ash also didn’t completely understand what was happening, so Gwyn would have to…explain it to him? Perhaps Ash had spent so long in the human realm, there were some things he didn’t understand. It seemed impossible, given Augus was his brother, and understood so much of the intricacies of fae etiquette and debt.

It made sense too that Ash’s glamour wasn’t working. He was interceding on Augus’ behalf, and Augus couldn’t use his glamour to escape a debt, therefore Ash couldn’t either. Unwittingly, it sounded like a lot of the Winter Court had become unknowing enforcers of the debt, because Munaciello was using his influence to remove the curse that stopped him from feeling drunk.

‘What do I do?’ Ash said. ‘I thought I was doing the right thing, and just trying to manage it. I know no one else has time to deal with the Winter Court.’

‘No one else wants to deal with it,’ Gwyn said absently. ‘But the debt is easy enough to manage. Have Augus meet with the linchetti in the palace, and he can tell them he no longer has access to that alcohol. Then, they can name a more reasonable debt, and he can meet it. No fae can lay an impossible claim to another.’

Ash went quiet, stared down at his folders. Gwyn observed him, was always a bit disconcerted by the way Ash could sometimes look so like his brother. In the angle of his jaw, the shadow at a cheekbone, or the thick lashes even if they were paler, and not the solid black of Augus’.

‘I just thought I could keep him out of this,’ Ash said. ‘He’s… It’s been ages, he’s changed a lot. I thought I could pay the debt.’

‘It’s not yours to pay,’ Gwyn said calmly.

‘Obviously I can _pay it_ if it’s affecting my glamour,’ Ash said, eyes sparking bright.

‘But you _can’t_ pay it,’ Gwyn said. ‘What they’re asking for is impossible. Munaciello is only the middleman, he doesn’t know why you’re not giving him the liquor, and he’s likely quite discombobulated to be affected by that curse. The linchetti aren’t the most malicious Unseelie fae, if they hear that Augus doesn’t have the liquor, they will think of something else. They were willing to accept treasure from Munaciello, Ash.’

‘Can I do it?’ Ash said. ‘If I meet with a representative of the linchetti? I can do it, right?’

‘It’s not your debt to pay,’ Gwyn said again. He could understand the urge to want to shoulder someone else’s burden, but this was absurd. If Augus wanted to activate and pay those kinds of debts, he could. Gwyn made sure it happened as safely as possible, all the debts claimed had to be reasonable, and Augus – for the most part – simply did what he could and avoided the Winter Court unless it was a formal occasion.

‘But I can?’ Ash said. Gwyn couldn’t fathom why he was so upset about it.

‘Not with the help of Thursday.’

‘No, but if I- If I scrap all that, and tell them it doesn’t exist, and like…’

‘Ash,’ Gwyn said, ‘if you had simply told Munaciello at the time that the liquor didn’t exist, this would all be…less complicated. Why are you so obsessed with this?’

Ash’s fingers dug into the table, and then dropped beneath it, but his shoulders shifted in a way that suggested he was wringing his hands. He shook his head, shot a dark look at Gwyn, shook it again and looked away.

‘This is how you’re really Seelie,’ Ash said carefully. ‘I’d do anything for him, right or wrong. It’s not about the justness in who should pay the debt, it’s that I want to do it for him, because he’s already- And I haven’t… I just think I can pay this. Maybe you think Augus should, he earned it and all that. But Augus has _changed,_ and it’s not like he’s flush with cash or anything.’

Gwyn looked around the meeting room, forced his breathing to remain even. He subtly paid attention to the atmosphere around him, but no, Ash wasn’t using his glamour at all, even now. There was something in the raw way Ash was speaking, and Gwyn felt himself falling towards it.

‘Augus would pay it,’ Ash continued, ‘especially if he knew it was stressing me out. Of course he would. But why should he have to pay everything? And it’s not like I haven’t done this before.’

He knew Ash hadn’t meant to say the last sentence from his reaction to it, and Gwyn certainly hadn’t expected to hear it.

‘When did this start?’ Gwyn said.

‘When do you think?’

‘Before his capture?’

Ash shrugged, and then stood up and walked away from the table, away from Gwyn, towards the side of the room with the bookshelves. His hands were shoved deep into the pockets of his jeans.

‘Does he know?’ Gwyn said.

‘Fuck no,’ Ash said, turning back like it hadn’t even occurred to him that Augus could find out. He looked horrified. ‘It’s gonna stay that way.’

‘Is it?’ Gwyn said coolly, just to see what Ash would do.

Ash’s expression shifted from something of horror, to something lost. His mouth was open, eyes wide, and his mouth worked on something, and then he looked at the bookshelf again. His shoulders were hunched. Gwyn couldn’t sense an ounce of glamour in the room.

‘I’d like it to stay that way,’ Ash said to the bookshelves. ‘Wouldn’t you?’

‘How many fae? How many debts?’

‘Not as many as I probably should’ve,’ Ash said, sighing. ‘I don’t like to live here. Um, not _here,_ but like…’ he gestured around his head. ‘The whole fae realm. But when I was living in the Unseelie Court, like, when the Nightingale was around, and then when I was King, and I guess a little now… God, you don’t think- haven’t you ever wondered why there aren’t _more_ fae claiming debts from him?’

‘I thought a lot of them were dead,’ Gwyn said.

‘Yeah,’ Ash said bitterly, turning to smile at Gwyn with something that lacked all humour. ‘That too. A lot of them are. But some of the rest, I just… And I did it a few times at first, and then I suppose it went around that I did that. But maybe not, if you didn’t know about it. Fuck knows. I just- It was never… It just seemed easier for me to do. It’s not like he could pay shit when he was in a cell. I can’t make up for Gulvi’s family being dead. I can’t make up for Augus being taken. All the times he was taken. I should be able to do this, right?’

Gwyn rubbed at his chin, and then reached over to the folders Ash had and opened them up, looking inside. He was surprised at how meticulous the notes were, even if the handwriting was horrendous. The requests from the Unseelie Winter Court, Munaciello’s story itemised per date, with questions beneath that tracked the inconsistencies, even a chart of the liquor the linchetti had requested, along with those that were made in batches and might still be attainable.

‘Why haven’t you ever asked me?’ Ash said quickly.

‘Asked you what?’ Gwyn said, confused.

‘Don’t I owe you something?’

Gwyn stilled, a piece of parchment in his fingers.

‘If you think it has to be all just and righteous,’ Ash said, ‘why haven’t you asked me?’

‘What debt do we have?’ Gwyn said slowly. ‘We have nothing. There’s no blood debt between us. The fae that died because Ifir incited mutiny – you had a role in that, yes, but Ifir was the one who went and persuaded the others, came up with the plan. Do you think one conversation with Ifir was enough to create an organised attack against me? Of course you were the instigator, but if you think Ifir does anything half-cocked, or without an idea in his head already, then you don’t know him very well.’

Gwyn had given this some thought, especially now that he and Ifir worked together on a regular basis. Strange, to share military strategy with someone he didn’t entirely trust. But he could have faith that Ifir hated the Seelie more than he’d ever dislike Gwyn, and that was enough to keep them both on track and focused.

Ash shook his head, but didn’t say anything.

‘What debt do you owe Augus,’ Gwyn continued, ‘that you keep doing this for him?’

‘It’s not like that,’ Ash said. ‘I would just do that for him. I would work here for him, even if I hated it. I would pay his debts, and work to make sure he never knows about it. I’d stay out of his way, if I knew he was kind of sick of me, and didn’t need me anymore. That’s what you do. It’s just what you do. But I owe you something too.’

‘I don’t want anything from you.’

‘Maybe because you don’t know what to ask for,’ Ash said. ‘But I mean- I know. But me just leaving you alone, is that enough?’

Gwyn knew he’d have to look into this more. How had none of them known that Ash was paying Augus’ debts? Was he using his glamour to hide it? His compulsions? No, Ash had an aversion to using his compulsions. His glamour, perhaps.

‘Your dra’ocht,’ Gwyn said abruptly.

‘I can’t turn it off anymore than I do,’ Ash said, expression falling. ‘I can’t. Maybe there’s some kind of magic, or-’

‘No,’ Gwyn said, holding up a hand. ‘What is its natural state?’

‘Huh?’

‘What does it feel like if it’s just…there, and you’re not doing anything with it?’

‘Oh,’ Ash said. ‘Now?’

‘Yes.’

Ash narrowed his eyes at nothing, and then Gwyn felt it immediately. A kind of warmth in the room, an energy in the air around them that felt a little like holding one’s chilled hands over a candle.

‘That’s its natural state?’ Gwyn said.

‘Yep,’ Ash said. ‘This is just…this is normal.’

Gwyn also felt the moment that Ash began suppressing it again, and Gwyn shook his head.

‘Leave it,’ Gwyn said.

‘No, but-’

‘I said leave it.’

Ash tensed, but that warmth returned. It was obvious that Ash was uncomfortable, but Gwyn had rarely gotten a sense of it when it wasn’t being used as a weapon, or as something to coddle the Unseelie Court. Augus’ glamour shifted and changed like water, it was a presence in the room, neutral until it needed to be something else. It rarely felt warm.

‘It’s different from Augus’,’ Gwyn said.

‘Yeah,’ Ash said. ‘It is. I dunno why. I think because we hunt differently. Who knows?’

‘Does it affect you? In the same way?’

‘Nope,’ Ash said, shrugging. ‘It just feels like…I dunno. Like I’m not holding it in. That’s it. I know how it feels to others. Heard it enough times. But if I turn it up, I can influence myself with it. Should I stop now?’

‘You do understand that the thing about your dra’ocht that bothered me, was that you weaponised it? Not that you _have_ it?’

‘I know how triggers work,’ Ash said. ‘Why use it at all if I don’t have to?’

‘I’d like to get accustomed to it,’ Gwyn said. ‘Every time you hide it, I know you’re hiding it.’

‘I don’t like using it around you,’ Ash said, his voice quieter now. ‘It reminds me too, y’know. And I use it without thinking, when it’s there all the time. There’s nothing to guarantee I won’t just try and I dunno, calm down the Inner Court during a squabble or something.’

Gwyn nodded absently, kept looking over the paperwork of Ash’s, and then leaned back in his chair.

‘Ash, Augus doesn’t have to pay any of these debts. He chooses to. He’s never had to.’

Ash frowned, looked like he was going to argue. Gwyn sighed, tucked a curl of unruly hair behind his ear. How was this something that Ash didn’t understand?

‘You likely don’t know how many people I’ve killed,’ Gwyn said, ‘but I don’t owe them anything. Some of them will come to me and claim something – on behalf of family, friends, themselves if they survived me. If I _accept_ their claim – then a debt will activate. But the claim should be rightly repudiated. That’s my choice. I’m not sure how _Seelie_ that is of me, but I don’t suffer for the people I’ve killed and I’d no sooner pay their claims than I would make peace with every foodstuff I’ve ever consumed or ant I’d trodden on. It’s not a _life_ debt. Even blood debts can be repudiated.’

‘Yeah, but…if I didn’t pay them, wouldn’t they just go to Augus?’

‘Augus _should_ be repudiating the claims,’ Gwyn said. ‘He chooses not to – out of guilt, a need to make recompense, and likely other motives. For Augus, it might just be to prove he can. It’s his choice. He _wants_ to do it. What you do- That takes a choice away from him. Munaciello just wants the leverage, which he collects as easily as he seeks treasure. He should have said no to the linchetti, and you should have said no to Munaciello. In light of nothing like common sense happening, Augus will have to find out about it.’

Ash came and sat down again. Briefly, he touched the back of his head, the same place Augus would touch if he wanted to soothe himself. He looked across the large table, then past Gwyn, to the list of their allies and enemies. He drummed blunt fingernails against the table.

‘He doesn’t have to pay them at all? I thought it was like a life debt, because he took a life.’

‘A life debt is when you _save_ a life. Goodness, what a world it would be if fae owed significant debts every time someone was killed. It would probably be a rather more pleasant place.’

‘I’ve never claimed a life debt,’ Ash said thoughtfully. ‘I don’t know that I’d want to. The people whose lives I’ve saved, like, I did it because I wanted to, not so they’d owe me.’

‘And that’s why a lot of life debts are never claimed,’ Gwyn said, shrugging. Had Ash saved many lives in the fae realm? Gwyn had no idea about that either. He really knew…very little about Ash, except what he heard from others, and how Ash had behaved towards him regarding Augus. He wondered how tightly curated Ash’s personal life was. Just like everyone saw Gwyn only as a King and War General. He wondered if he even wanted to know what more there was to Ash.

‘Fucking hell,’ Ash said, forehead thumping on the table. ‘I don’t know anything about this stuff. I thought I was helping.’

‘In some way, you likely were,’ Gwyn said.

‘I mean if there were other ways I could _help,_ you’d tell me, right?’ Ash looked up, his eyes bright. ‘You’d tell me?’

‘Of course.’

Ash tilted his head, then smirked. ‘Liar.’

Gwyn resisted the urge to shift, to look down. He had no real idea of what he could ask for, beyond Ash’s intervention in the Winter Court. But wasn’t that what Ash had said? Hadn’t he seen already, that Gwyn didn’t know?

‘Your life would be so much easier if I wasn’t here,’ Ash said. ‘I mean, Winter Court aside, right? If that disappeared tomorrow…’

‘How much time do you think I give to worrying about you?’ Gwyn said. He realised as he said it, how callous it sounded, but it was the truth, wasn’t it? Didn’t Augus say that Ash valued the truth? ‘I don’t trust you. I hardly know you. But as you and I sit here, there are fae out there right now who have arrows with a poison on them that will kill me, and we can’t find them. I have _real_ enemies. I’m quite certain you’re no longer trying to be one.’

‘That actually…helps,’ Ash said, in something that sounded like wonder. Then he laughed softly, something that was so like Augus, that Gwyn almost wanted to teleport away, find Augus on his diplomatic mission, and insist he return. ‘Except the whole people waiting to kill you thing, that’s not great.’

‘I’m somewhat used to it,’ Gwyn said blandly. ‘I had a period of time as King where I was mostly invulnerable, but most of my life, someone has wanted me dead and had the power to make it happen.’

There was nothing much to say then. Gwyn thought of Crielle and Lludd, of Efnisien. Sometimes they seemed very far away, now that they were all dead. But sometimes he could still freshly smell the oleanders in Crielle’s favoured perfume, or see the tilt of a knife and think of Efnisien’s gleaming grin behind it. But even striking out his family, he’d been in battle from such a young age that he’d always had enemies, people who wanted to capture him, torture him, kill him outright.

‘That’s even less great,’ Ash said. ‘That’s not something a person should have to get used to. I mean compartmentalisation, right? I’m a huge fan. But seriously, well, I mean it’s none of my business. Y’know, you said you don’t really know me, I don’t really know you either? Except what people say. Or…the things I see, which aren’t much of anything really. Do you ever think like, Augus loves you, and Gulvi loves you, and they’re the two most important people in my life – so, would you ever be up for like, I dunno…’

Ash looked down at the table and a strange look came over his face, something cynical and lost, a quick furrowing of his brow, a twist to his mouth, and then it was gone. He shook his head, smiled, looked up at Gwyn and shrugged.

‘Forget it, man. I just realised what I sound like. I mean, sure, you’re going to want to get to know me after everything that happened, right? And why would you want me to get to know you? I’m sorry.’

Gwyn had seen Ash schmooze in the Winter Court. So he knew, firsthand, that Ash could make any social interaction look easy and effortless. Knew and envied it and wondered what secret power it was that his mother and Ash had in such abundance, and why Gwyn scraped for tiny pieces of the same. Oh, he could work a room if it was to rouse people for war or battle, but anything else? Best that his citizens see him as distant, remote, unknowable. The truth was far more embarrassing.

So it was bizarre now to see Ash uncomfortable, reticent, self-deprecating. Ash’s glamour hadn’t changed. It was still that simple warmth. Gwyn knew if he asked Ash to stop it, Ash would put it away and likely never use it around him again unless Gwyn asked for that too.

‘Another thing you’d put yourself through, for him?’ Gwyn said quietly. ‘Like paying the debts that you don’t have to pay, and working here, and-’

Ash looked up quickly, his eyes widening in horror.

_‘No,’_ Ash said. ‘No, not like that. Not like a _debt._ Not… God, Jesus, if anything you’d be doing me a fucking favour.’ He stared ahead, then a half-smile crossed his face and vanished. ‘I’m lonely. And you seem like someone who could do with company sometimes. Maybe if it’s just when Augus isn’t here. It doesn’t have to be _my_ company. That’s the part where I’m being selfish.’

‘You’re…lonely,’ Gwyn said, unable to wrap his mind around the idea of it. Ash, who had so many companions and pals and friends in so many places? Was that _possible?_ It seemed like the most absurd thing Ash had said so far.

‘You don’t believe me?’ Ash said, voice a little weaker than before.

‘You have your pick of literally _anyone,_ in- As far as I understand it, in both realms. In wherever you want-’

‘Ah, right,’ Ash said. ‘It’s not the same. Those people don’t give a shit about me, really. They like the glamour and how it makes them feel. Or they like the sex and how that makes them feel. Or they like the fucking booze and how that makes them feel. Are you friends with all of your soldiers? Like, you trust them to have your back, but, are they all your besties or something? Or would that just be weird?’

‘Bestie?’

‘Best friend,’ Ash said, chuckling.

‘Oh, no, then they’re not my besties.’

Ash paused, then laughed, rubbing a hand over his face. The warmth in the room spiked for a moment, then dropped, and Gwyn wondered if it was automatic, if Ash couldn’t help it when he laughed.  

‘Aw, man, never thought I’d hear you use a word like that. Maybe don’t use it in a speech or anything, it’s kind of slang. Human slang.’

‘Oh,’ Gwyn said.

‘Do you really just never go there? The human world?’

‘Not really,’ Gwyn said. ‘It smells funny. I never seem to get the clothing right. When I came, that time, to find you, it was obvious to others that I didn’t belong.’

‘Some of that’s just your dra’ocht,’ Ash said. ‘But yeah. Jeans and a shirt, these days, and you’ll go by pretty unnoticed. Except for how tall you are. And probably your pale hair and eyebrows and stuff might draw attention. And also how ripped you are. And the dra’ocht.’

‘So, not all that unnoticed then,’ Gwyn said, laughing.

‘I just think you’d attract like, a particular kind of attention if you were in jeans and a shirt and in like…a bar,’ Ash said, grinning.

‘Oh. What? _Really?’_

‘Mmhm. Yeah, the fae standards of beauty are pretty different to the human standards. Maybe you’d be what Tyra Banks calls ‘ugly pretty.’’

‘Tyra…who?’

‘Hm? Oh, no one. Human. Used to be on TV a whole lot.’

‘I know TV,’ Gwyn said. It wasn’t entirely a lie. He knew _of_ television. He’d never sat down and watched any. It wasn’t like the fae realm had ever taken up with it, though they could have if they wanted to.

‘Meanwhile I don’t know so much about the fae realm and all the intricacies,’ Ash said. ‘I thought I got the whole debt thing. I think I owe Augus a talk about that whole…him not repudiating things. I get that he feels bad, but there’s safer ways to go about it.’

‘You’re welcome to try,’ Gwyn said. ‘He’ll not hear any more about the subject from me.’

‘You’ve tried?’

‘Did you think I sat back and watched him do something so foolish without trying to intervene? I don’t agree with it. If he wants to pay penance, then rehabilitating the waterways he damaged is enough. Don’t you think it’s telling that even Gulvi has never claimed such a debt from him? She gripes about owing, but she’s never formalised it. Did you think I cared about him so little that I’d say nothing?’

‘Not that,’ Ash said. ‘I just thought you’d…leave him to it. I don’t know. It’s hard to talk Augus out of anything. Or into anything.’

‘I’d never noticed,’ Gwyn said, smirking a little. Ash smiled and rested his forearms on his folders. Then the expression faded, and he sighed.

‘So I really have to tell Augus about this?’

‘If you ever want your dra’ocht to work in the Winter Court again, it seems like it might be wise. In the meantime, we can see about organising some kind of event where there’s more quality alcohol than usual. If we just give it to them the rest of the time, they’ll expect it. The Winter Court costs enough as it is. It was only ever supposed to last a month.’

‘Yeah,’ Ash said. ‘I don’t think it’ll ever really wind down. Not properly. Maybe not until like, all the uncertainty and everything is over? Anyway, I guess I’ll speak to Augus about this. I don’t want to tell him about the past debts though. Don’t tell him?’

‘I won’t,’ Gwyn said. He had no real reason to.

‘And my dra’ocht, you want me to leave it at like, its base level? Really? Because I don’t mind-’

‘If your brother has taught me anything, it is that something suppressed in the long-term turns on itself and becomes poisonous. Best you stay comfortable with it.’

Gwyn stood, and Ash stood quickly, pushing his chair in and taking up the folders. He flashed Gwyn a quick smile, and then was walking to the door.

‘Ash.’

Ash stopped, his arm freezing as it reached for the door handle. ‘Yeah?’

‘He has no idea how unhappy you are, does he?’

Ash’s shoulders tensed as he stilled. Then they slumped and his arm dropped from the handle. He turned to Gwyn, one hand half-hugging the folders to himself.

‘Of all the things you’re- Augus said you weren’t very ah, y’know, emotionally…intelligent.’

‘I’m not.’

‘Could’ve fucking fooled me. And it’s just growing pains, right? It won’t last. Didn’t you have those, when you like, started ruling the Unseelie Court? Or- No, you’d already had practice in a way.’

‘I will never like being King.’

‘Ever?’

‘No.’

‘Does Augus know that?’

‘He does.’

‘I mean I know you joke about it sometimes, sort of, but you really don’t- Like, at all? Not even the whole mostly invincible and tons-of-power part?’

‘Not even that. I was mostly invincible and fairly powerful before I was made King.’

‘Right. Court status. So, there’s no pros at all?’

Gwyn pushed his chair in, turned to look at the list of their enemies which long outnumbered their allies. It was the Unseelie Court, they already had less allies than the Seelie Court when things were going well. Gwyn had inherited a Court that had recovered somewhat, but might not ever see itself as healthy as it had been during the Raven Prince’s era, or those golden ages of before. He thought of how he could be living in the woods instead, in his cabin, or hunting, or even on a battle campaign.

He turned back to Ash. ‘I get to keep Augus as safe as it’s possible to keep him.’

‘Except he’s out on some stupid diplomatic mission and we’re stuck here like giant assholes.’

‘Except that,’ Gwyn said, laughing ruefully. ‘Hadn’t you ever noticed? It’s hard to talk Augus out of anything, or into anything.’

Ash laughed, quickly touched the back of his head and then opened the door.

‘Oh, hey, thanks for this,’ Ash said, as he pulled the door closed behind him. ‘I’ll let you know how it goes.’

Gwyn waited a couple of minutes, alone in the room, and then eased himself back onto the table itself, looking back to the list of their enemies. He didn’t trust Ash, but somehow it helped knowing that he wasn’t happy either. He’d wondered in the past, but Ash always seemed so cheerful in the Winter Court, so on the ball and happy to brighten the mood in the Inner Court meetings.

But Ash being unhappy had led to all the sabotage of last time, hadn’t it? Except that last time there’d been an escalation that had lasted months and months. Ash harassing him, being cruel, hurting him. This time, Gwyn could tell it was different. But that didn’t mean he shouldn’t keep an eye on it, and he reminded himself to be more vigilant when it came to Ash’s behaviours around the Court.

It might be time to ask the trows to follow him and report back, just to be sure.


	3. Uncommon Interestst

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another Ash-perspective chapter, and could it be some actual progress between these two? *squints* Maybe!

_Ash_

*

Ash noticed the trows as he exited his lake. He noticed them, because they weren’t meant to be there. The trows lived in the Unseelie Court, they did what Gwyn wanted, and they were obviously trying to stay _hidden,_ and they didn’t like that Ash had seen them. That was the thing, after Ash had hunted: the world was sharper, clearer, and his senses were better. He’d scented them first – a sort of murky grey silver, which made no sense, but nothing in the fae world ever did. Then he’d seen them hiding there. Shifting and looking at each other once they’d realised Ash had spotted them. Weird.

For a second, he thought they were there to pass on a message from Augus, or to deliver something to him, but instead they vanished, and Ash squinted at the space that remained. Then he tasted blood in his mouth, the remnants of it, and was overcome with a sense of despair, unable to think of anything else for a while.

*

Back in his rooms in the Unseelie Court, he lay on his bed and threw a ball up at the ceiling, catching it over and over again, trying not to think about how he’d usually be dealing with these feelings by fucking them away, or drinking them away, or some other thing. Maybe even doing outreach for homeless people, because they were often good company. What humans called outreach felt a lot like just hanging out with people who weren’t supposed to socialise with popular folk anymore. Which felt a lot like how Seelie could treat Unseelie fae, and all in all, was familiar.

He’d be in Prague today, probably. Maybe in Melbourne. Somewhere populated. Somewhere it would be easy to meet someone who just wanted to fuck. Someone he could eat out for hours and worship and forget that he’d ever felt anything other than connection and joy and lust.

But he wasn’t in Prague.

He was pretty sure the trows were following him. Not for fun, but _following_ him, like surveillance. Everyone knew the trows were Gwyn’s. He’d had the Seelie ones in the Seelie Court, and the Unseelie ones in the Unseelie Court. Well, the Seelie ones too, enough of them visited and hung out. Ash thought they were actually pretty cool like that.

So he threw the ball over and over and tried not to be mad about it, but he was low-key pretty mad about it. Did he even have a right to be angry about it? He was pretty sure the trows had been following him for a _while_ , and he hadn’t noticed. Probably since the meeting with Gwyn. Since he’d revealed that all wasn’t well in Ash-land, and Gwyn had decided to put fucking trows on him because of _course,_ like, look at what Ash had done the last time Gwyn knew all wasn’t stable in Ash-land.

What annoyed him was that nothing had been stable. Nothing had been stable for decades. He fucked up, sure, but he’d been trying to break away from the part of him that dealt with instability by just spreading that shit around.

If not Prague, then Melbourne. The light there was crisp and the air was sweet, smelling vaguely medicinal in the summer, because of the eucalyptus forests all around. People got used to it, but Ash liked it. Melbourne felt like Augus’ city, even though Augus had never been there.

The ball thudded regularly against the ceiling, and Ash caught it easily.

He thought of all the times he’d gone to courses on racket sports. He’d done tennis and squash, he’d mastered basque pelota, both frontenis and xare when it’d been an Olympic sport still and his tutor had told him he was good enough to compete. Which was when Ash had bowed out, because he just wanted to learn it. Then matkot and later speed badminton, and then qianball.

One of the many, many things the fae realm was lacking, were structured school systems. Teaching academies. Oh, sure, the School of the Staff? What a rort that was. But otherwise, kids learned things in families, or they hired private tutors, and he couldn’t just rock up to some university to learn a whole bunch of fae skills because everyone stuck together and rarely shared, and so those universities just didn’t exist. Trows didn’t want to teach the rules of stealing silver and the Mers didn’t want to teach any land fae _anything,_ except maybe how to worship them, and common fae had been playing the exact same version of croquet that they’d been playing for years. Ash had gotten the hang of that over a millennia ago.

Humans invented new things all the time. And once they invented something new, they made classes to spread it around, to make money out of it, to share it. Once they made classes and schools, they made competitions and they gave it prestige. So many of them lived lives that were so full for the handful of years they got to invest in them.

All it boiled down to now, was that Ash could throw a ball against the ceiling and never break rhythm, never miss. It didn’t matter how much he stewed in his annoyance.

A hundred things were going through his head. He knew most of the human root words for annoyance, in different languages, and how nuanced they could be. He’d studied how humans in different cultures had treated the emotion – acting on it, not acting on it – in philosophy and sociology and anthropology. Psychology in its many forms had taught him about passive aggression and aggression and assertion and active listening and non-violent communication and more. Bars had taught him that sometimes things weren’t always better out, than in. Sometimes you had to lock that shit up, especially if you wanted to pair it with booze first.

He thought that Gwyn had every right to put trows on him for surveillance, but he wished Gwyn had just _talked_ about it with him first, except why would he? Why would he? He never fucking did that in the first place, and Ash hadn’t really given him much reason to anyway. Then Ash thought about all the crazy shit that had been going through his head leading up to that mutiny, and how he’d thought Augus was being beaten and raped and just playing it so well _, so well,_ because Augus did that except apparently he _didn’t_ do that anymore and Ash had just made it up because he was still so broken up about the Nightingale and that was just…

He felt bad for the trows. He was annoyed he’d not noticed it sooner. How long had they been on him? He’d not thought anything of it. Of course not. The trows were everywhere and they _liked_ to be invisible and if Ash hadn’t spotted them when he just happened to be in one of the most alert, predatory states he was ever in, he’d never have noticed them at all. Well, not for ages, anyway.

Yeah, he’d definitely be in Melbourne in a mood like this. It was a boutique brewery kind of night. It was a ‘how many flavours could they pack into that many beers anyway?’ kind of night.

He caught the ball and rested it on his forehead, and then laughed at himself until the ball rolled off onto the bed.

‘God, I’ve become such a miserable fucking shit,’ he said.

He got up and walked out of his rooms. His perfect rooms that suited him so well that _Gwyn_ had fucking made for him while transforming the whole stupid Unseelie Court back when Ash had hated his guts. Gwyn had even given him a library. Had Gwyn _known?_ Or was he just hoping Ash would learn to read?

Hilarious. Ash read so much. Especially now that he was living sober. Jesus.

But what if Gwyn had _known?_

He needed to talk to Gwyn. Otherwise he _was_ going to lose his damn mind.

*

It was tempting to go to all the places he knew Gwyn went to, but it was pointless. Gwyn often pissed off for reasons unclear – though Ash suspected it had a lot to do with things that Gwyn would never talk to _him_ about – and then there was the fact that he just did a million things anyway. Gwyn was active in the fae world the way that Ash was active in the human realm. Sans all the sex. He hoped.

Ash really did _not_ want to think about that and compare notes.

It was difficult. Was a time when Ash would share his exploits with his brother, and Augus would do the same – protecting all confidentiality of his clients by being vague about it – and they’d weirdly bond, but it’d be great. Now Ash couldn’t do that. He didn’t have regular lovers anymore, and Augus had one. He had one, who was like…well, it was just really fucking complicated. All he really knew about their sex life was that Gwyn was submissive to Augus, and that Augus had broken his heartsong for a _second goddamned time_ because Ash had pushed them to it.

Not the way he ever wanted to be involved in anyone’s sex life, so he just tried to not think about it.

He ended up flagging some trows, who looked shiftier than normal when he approached them.

‘It’s cool, guys,’ he said. ‘I just need to find Gwyn. It’s important.’

The two trows he’d found looked at each other. They signed rapidly. Ash reckoned he knew about a quarter of the language, which was just enough to be able to see that they’d signed his name, and Gwyn’s name, and something about uncertainty.

‘Really important,’ Ash said, leaning against the wall. ‘There’d be some silver in it for you?’

Bright, luminous eyes then, and Ash grinned at them. Made a mental note to leave some silver out in his rooms. He had enough of it. He’d invested in silver when it looked like it might be valuable, but then it turned out the human world had a ton of it, and whoops. He could definitely leave some around.

They took him through the castle, signing to each other as they went. Ash could tell they weren’t talking about him or Gwyn, just having their own conversation, so he didn’t eavesdrop by trying to understand it. He’d tried to pick up their language, but it changed all the time. Apparently the Unseelie trows changed their dialect faster than the Seelie trows did, which was something Augus had told him in the process of telling him that Gwyn was still pretty fluent. Where did Gwyn find the _time_ to keep up with a language like that?

From what Augus had said, Gwyn was kind of a savant at some things. Of course Augus had never used that word, but Augus veered away from complimenting Gwyn too often around Ash. They all tiptoed around him. Well, not tiptoed exactly, they’d just changed how they behaved ages ago, and never changed it to anything else. Why would they?

Ash didn’t know why it bothered him so much.

Then, the trows stood before a plain wooden door and indicated that Ash should knock, and then they ran off down the corridor. Awesome. He really hoped he wasn’t about to walk in on some kind of… _something_ with Augus. He did not need that in his head.

_Just knock already._

So he knocked, waited, shoved his hands into his jeans pockets and then realised how stupid that looked, and how he was _never like this with anyone else._ Fucking nervous as all hell. He pulled his hands out and tried to look casual, which meant that he didn’t look casual at all. He’d seen other people try to attempt that in bars like, tens of thousands of times by now, he knew what he looked like.

The door opened a couple of minutes later, and Gwyn looked down at him, surprised. He had two thin paintbrushes tucked behind one ear, and a smear of green paint – ink? – at the corner of his jaw.

‘Yes?’ Gwyn said.

‘We gotta talk,’ Ash said. ‘I know about the surveillance detail.’

Gwyn’s expression went from open to closed, and Ash wondered what he expected.

‘I just want to talk,’ Ash said about as patiently as he could manage. Now that he was standing there, he was pissed off all over again that Gwyn just hadn’t _talked_ to him about it in the first place. Hell, he could’ve handled Gwyn saying that he was putting Ash under surveillance _just in case,_ and Ash could’ve gone, ‘sure, man, whatever you need,’ and then at least everyone would’ve known about it. Maybe Gwyn just assumed Ash would try and shake the trows.

‘Fine,’ Gwyn said.

He stepped backwards, and Ash walked into a room that smelled of ink and varnish and the kinds of heavy papers he associated with artists. It wasn’t a huge room, and he stared at all the half-finished maps either hanging on the wall, or rolled and waiting in a shelf. There was one pinned down on a draftsperson’s desk, with an open pot of green ink, a glass of water, and Ash hesitated, then walked over to it and looked down.

‘You do these,’ Ash said quietly.

He thought of the maps he’d occasionally seen hanging in the palace and frowned. They didn’t all look like they’d been done by the same person, but going by this style, some of them-

‘Have you done the ones hanging in the palace?’

‘A few,’ Gwyn said.

‘This reminds me of the stuff Al-Idrisi did,’ Ash said. ‘Did you ever see the Tabula Rogeriana? You know for like three hundred years, his maps were so good – and he was human – that they just…they copied his stuff without changing it? Even with all the changes… But the Tabula Rogeriana is just also very- I didn’t know you did these.’

‘You know…cartography?’ Gwyn said, sounding confused. Ash looked at him over his shoulder, and Gwyn’s face didn’t hold that hardness anymore, but looked strangely open.

‘Not fae world cartography,’ Ash said. ‘I don’t even know where this is. I don’t know where most of these places are.’

‘I try to map places that are unfamiliar or poorly documented,’ Gwyn said.

‘Huh. Well…’ Ash turned back and looked at the delicate layering of calligraphy over what was maybe watercolours? Other inks? ‘That makes sense.’

‘Do you know of Angelino de Dulceto?’

‘Dulceti? The Italian guy?’ Ash said. ‘I mean I never _met_ him, but yeah. Portolans, right? Only two though.’

‘Humans never lived long enough to…make many in their lifetimes,’ Gwyn said. ‘In their individual lifetimes.’

‘Where do you find the time for this?’

‘I don’t,’ Gwyn said, laughing softly. ‘I bought some back from the Seelie Court. When Albion- They auctioned a lot my property off, and I had an investor buy back every map that wasn’t yet finished. But, otherwise… I didn’t know you knew about cartography.’

‘Not fae cartography,’ Ash said, sitting on one of the chairs next to the one Gwyn sat in. Ash thought, from a very faint scent, that Augus sat in here sometimes. On this chair? Watching him? ‘I mean do fae mapmakers even know about rhumb-lines, loxodromes and windrose lines and shit? Or are they calling them something else?’

‘As with all things, we stole most of the terminology from the human realm,’ Gwyn said, smiling a little, as he sat down. He looked more relaxed than before, and Ash made a personal note to himself that maybe Gwyn’s side interests were a good inroad to getting him to look less tense. ‘We master the skills better, they invent the terms faster. I had no idea you were interested in cartography.’

‘Mm,’ Ash said. ‘A little. I apprenticed to Ortelius for a while, on the side. And then uh, I think I drifted off and did a few other things, and then I spent a lot of time in Russia – well, it was sort of Russia back then – and did a few things there. Shokalsky helped me out, some, but I never got a proper grounding in it. Just enough to know bits and pieces. How does it work fae-side?’

‘I apprenticed,’ Gwyn said, ‘when I was younger. To Master Ethwynn.’

‘Well, fuck. Even I’ve heard of him. He was like- Really? You apprenticed to him? I didn’t know that.’

‘Not many do,’ Gwyn said. ‘My life led me in other directions. Now it’s just- I’m a hobbyist.’

‘Some hobbyist though. These are amazing. I know I’m not the only one who thinks so. What do you do with them once you’re done?’

‘It depends. Some I keep. Some I give away. Some are useful in politics and battle manoeuvres. It really depends.’

‘Huh,’ Ash said, looking around the room again. So Gwyn was super good at war, and languages, and battle, and _maps,_ which meant he was an artist and a calligrapher as well. ‘You’re a polymath.’

‘Oh,’ Gwyn said, his cheeks going pink. ‘No, I-’

‘You are though,’ Ash said. ‘It’s cool. I won’t tell. Anyway, about these trows.’

‘When did you realise?’ Gwyn said, frowning.

‘Not that long ago. But I know what it’s about. I’m trying really hard not to be mad about it because I _get_ it, I do. But like- So I come to you and tell you I’m worried about a situation in the Winter Court, and you tell me how to resolve that, but because I don’t seem what – super stable or something – you put trows on me? In case I…incite your military to half-destroy you again?’

‘That’s not exactly how I’d put it,’ Gwyn said slowly. ‘But close enough.’

Yeah, Ash was annoyed about it. He hated that he was. He had no right to be.

‘And what are they reporting back to you? Should I be worried? Are _you_ worried?’

Gwyn shifted, awkwardly. It was strange seeing it, because he was pretty sure Gwyn went to lengths to hide that most of the time.

‘Are you?’ Gwyn said finally.

‘Okay, I’m gonna explain something, and you can take it or leave it…’ Ash said. ‘Probably leave it. Whatever. So remember when you decided to drown yourself balls deep in alcohol and then Augus basically had to save you from yourself so that you didn’t like…destroy everything you’d tried to build?’

The look Gwyn gave him screamed ‘low blow,’ but Ash persisted.

‘Yeah, he told me about that. Because I was scared shitless at the alcohol you’d taken without so much as a by your leave. Okay. But here’s the thing I know about you. You’re kind of fucked up all the time. I don’t mean that as an insult. I just know my brother, right? And I’ve gotten to know you a little. But amazingly, you manage to make all of this work. Like, the castle, managing it, being a polymath. That night when you got all that booze, it was like a hiccup. You’d had your general instability, the general shittiness, and it just got pushed way beyond where it normally sat, because we were defeated by Albion and honestly we _all_ took that really hard.’

He’d expected Gwyn to interrupt him long before now.

‘I am also kind of fucked up all the time,’ Ash said, laughing. ‘Augus would be the first to tell you, but just so you know, I’m aware of it too. Not like you, I’m sure. You have actual shitty stuff and I just have being me, and that’s like- Like the thing I hate is just that I’m me, right? But it’s enough, apparently. You don’t need more. The Nightingale didn’t help. But I’ve _always-_ And here’s the thing, I make all of it work. Every day. I do that. And what happened with the mutiny, with those months leading up to it, it was a hiccup. One that lasted longer than usual, sure, but haven’t you- Haven’t you had times where you’ve…been in zones like that? Do you even get what I’m trying to say?’

‘You’re saying that you being unstable or unhappy doesn’t mean you’re likely to go to extremes first,’ Gwyn said quietly. ‘It’s simply the status quo.’

‘Yeah,’ Ash said. ‘It’s that.’

‘The trows hadn’t been reporting back a great deal,’ Gwyn said finally. ‘It’s also not the first time I’ve had them on you.’

_‘What?’_

Gwyn smirked a little, and then the expression slid away and he just shook his head.

‘I put a tracking spell on Augus without his knowledge,’ Gwyn added. ‘Augus knows about it now. But if you wondered that if it was only a you-specific behaviour- I simply like to know what’s going on.’

‘You could ask? With words.’

‘No- It’s…’ Gwyn grimaced. ‘The trows… They say you spend a lot of time in the Winter Court. You hunt. You read. You don’t drink or go into the human realm to fuck as you used to in the past. That- It does concern me that you have no real outlets here. The Winter Court doesn’t count.’

‘It fucking does not,’ Ash said quietly. ‘You’re concerned?’

‘I’m allowed to be concerned,’ Gwyn said. ‘With what’s happened in the past.’

Ash didn’t think it sounded like that kind of concern, it didn’t sound _political._ But he decided to leave it alone. Maybe it was. Maybe that was the only way Gwyn knew how to see the world.

Gwyn, who had sounded unexpectedly pleased and even excited when Ash knew cartography terms. When he’d just paid…a mild interest in something Gwyn did. The same person who put a tracking spell on Augus and then put trows on Ash.

‘What about Gulvi? Fenwrel? You track them?’

‘Fenwrel is harder,’ Gwyn said, shaking his head. ‘It’s impossible to track her. She expects it, and she knows how to evade it.’

‘…It’s like, it’s simultaneously helping to know that you kind of do this with everyone or _want_ to in a way, but also not helping at all. Because I know why you’ve done it this time. I get that you don’t have to give me the benefit of the doubt. I’m not sure I would either. But I guess I’m just- Shit. I guess I’m just saying I’m not a fan.’

Ash closed his eyes to stop himself from rolling them. Really? That was it? He wasn’t a _fan?_

‘Don’t you think we should talk about it one day? In more detail?’ Ash said. ‘What I did? Not just the mutiny. Everything in the lead up? Aren’t you angrier about it?’

‘Why should I be? You were trying to protect your brother.’

‘I tormented you,’ Ash said. ‘From the beginning. I held my power over you when I was King. And I never got _better,_ when I was a member of your Inner Court. You know that Inner Court members are – in exchange for their status raise – supposed to want to protect the monarch? I didn’t know that. But did you? And then I was behaving like _that_ the entire time.’

‘What do you want me to say?’ Gwyn said, sounding tired. ‘I didn’t like it. It’s not happening now. Even with you realising I have you under surveillance. Anyway. It’s good you’re here, in the palace. You hold me accountable.’

Ash almost nodded along to that part, and then squinted down at the ground, where ink had soaked into the wood.

‘I hold you accountable,’ Ash repeated, trying to work out what was so wrong with that. Was a time when he wouldn’t thought anything of it, but now… ‘Okay. Okay… How? What, my being here reminds you to treat Augus well, or something? You wouldn’t do it otherwise?’

‘No,’ Gwyn said. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Don’t you?’ Ash said, staring at Gwyn. ‘What did you mean?’

‘It doesn’t matter.’

‘It kind of does,’ Ash said. ‘Did you think I was holding you _accountable,_ when- Before? When I was treating you like shit?’

‘Well, you were,’ Gwyn said.

_What…the fuck?_

‘Oh boy,’ Ash said, laughing weakly. He shut that up quickly, because Gwyn was giving him a perplexed look, and Ash wished Gwyn had just gone back to being the cold douche that he was so good at being, because none of this should be confusing. None of this should need to be _explained._ The dude had been alive for thousands of years, for fuck’s sake, how did he not _know?_

‘I thought I was doing that,’ Ash said, ‘but I wasn’t. Abusing you isn’t how you hold someone accountable. I should’ve- Me trying to _talk_ to you about it, or talk to Augus about it – instead of just accusing you and treating him like he was stupid – that would’ve been a better way of going about things.’

Gwyn still looked confused, and Ash suddenly knew he couldn’t just burst out with the question: Don’t you know being abused isn’t about accountability? He knew. He knew how it would end. Gwyn would get up and leave, and the trows may or may not keep following Ash, and that would be that. But Ash couldn’t think what else to do.

He also was pretty sure he couldn’t bury beneath whatever had cemented that as some kind of truth in Gwyn’s head. Not if Augus hadn’t done it already.

‘Okay,’ Ash said quietly. ‘Okay. If it helps you to have the trows on me, then it helps. I don’t like it, but as far as spies go, they’re pretty quiet. But I don’t know how comfortable they are with it. And I don’t want you to draw the wrong conclusion if you see that I’m not happy with things. That’s not- That’s not my warning sign. If I start drinking again, to excess, _all the time,_ that’s a good one. And if I treat you badly, that’s another. They were the main two.’

Gwyn nodded, looked like he was actually taking it on board. Ash had no idea if he was.

‘Secondly,’ Ash said. ‘It’s not my job to hold you accountable like that. I didn’t show Augus enough trust, because-’

‘He needs people to look out for him,’ Gwyn said quickly. ‘He does. He wouldn’t admit it, but he does.’

‘Yeah, that’s a whole other…’ Ash scratched idly at his shoulder, where a trickle of water had slid down his skin. He still wore human clothing for the most part, and his shirt was wet. ‘Man, you are hard to talk to.’

He expected Gwyn to disagree with him, but Gwyn said nothing at all. If it was anyone else, he’d use his glamour to create more warmth in the room, but instead he left it at its baseline, since that’s what Gwyn wanted these days.

How did Augus deal with this? His glamour wasn’t relaxing at all.

‘It’s not my job,’ Ash said again, ‘to hold you accountable _like that._ I don’t want it to be my job, and I don’t like the idea of it. Even if you think that’s my role. And I’m sorry for my part in creating and reinforcing that. If I don’t like something happening between the two of you, I’ll go talk to Augus about it, like a normal person would. I won’t corner you privately and bully you, just to watch you twisting on the hook.’ _Do you get how one of those things is normal and the other one isn’t?_ ‘Because that was wrong. No one should treat you like that.’

He got to see it, the moment Gwyn’s face twisted in an expression that clearly said that people _were_ supposed to treat him like that. It didn’t last long. Gwyn’s face turned expressionless soon after, but Ash still saw it.

Did Augus have strategies he used for this? What the hell did he do? Ash was going to talk to him about it. He didn’t want to trample on anything Augus had put in place. Ash could be a bit of a trampler.

‘Do you think it’s wrong in turn, that I have you under surveillance?’ Gwyn said finally.

‘Wrong like what I just said? No. It’s not that kind of wrong. It’s just- It’s just clear that you don’t trust me. I’ve already said I get that. I just would feel weird if I didn’t tell you how I felt about it.’

‘I see.’

‘That was all. I didn’t know what I was gonna bring up, I just knew I needed to talk to you about it. Y’know, clear the air so that I didn’t get all resentful and stupid about it, when I do think you have a right to not trust me, and take action based on that. Right?’

Gwyn looked at Ash in consideration, and then nodded. Sometimes Ash wondered what he saw. There were these huge, obvious things he missed. And then he looked at Ash like he was seeing _everything._

‘Hey,’ Ash said, ‘when you gave me- when you made the rooms for me here, why did you give me a library? Like, was it some kind of hint? Crack a book, Ash?’

‘What?’ Gwyn said, looking shocked. ‘No! Do you not like it? Augus said- I’d gathered that you enjoyed reading. Was that not right? The trows say that you read frequently. But if you feel obligated-’

Ash held up a hand, laughed, and then smiled. ‘I like it. I read. What did Augus say?’

‘It was never much. In the Seelie- I once noticed him reading a book on human subjects of philosophy and psychotherapy, which I thought was an odd choice for him. I only worked out that he missed you so, later. And then later still he said that you liked to read, appreciated different subjects. I thought it might be pleasing for you to have a library of your own.’

Gwyn was talking about Augus’ time in the Seelie Court. Ash knew hardly anything about it. Augus hardly talked about it, and Gwyn had never said a single thing about it. Ash only knew from vague memories of the Display, from Gulvi bragging that Gwyn was likely torturing Augus as much as he deserved, from the rumours. Instead, Augus had been reading books on psychology? Because he missed Ash? And Gwyn had…allowed that?

Ash wanted to ask about it, and he desperately didn’t want to know, either. He didn’t. Augus had been plain – they’d both hurt each other in that Court. He didn’t want to know what Augus was capable of. He didn’t want to know what Gwyn was capable of.

But he’d not expected that there’d been much by the way of…nuance. Tenderness.

‘I like the library,’ Ash said.

‘If you want a place to dabble in cartography again,’ Gwyn said, ‘you’re welcome to a spare room. Or you could come here when I’m not working. I have a lot of extra inks I never get around to using, and there’s always spare vellum. Or paper, if you prefer.’

‘I could do that here?’ Ash said, surprised Gwyn would offer as much. The place screamed _personal space._ ‘I wouldn’t want to muscle in, hey, I’d be happy with- I mean I haven’t done it in _decades.’_

‘Did you enjoy it?’

‘Yeah,’ Ash said. ‘Not like you, I think. But it was meditative, and precise. I dunno, I liked it.’

‘Meditative and precise,’ Gwyn said, looking down to the side. Smiling a little. ‘That is a good way of putting it.’

‘I have no locations to map,’ Ash said. ‘I don’t know- Maybe…’

‘You could start with your lake,’ Gwyn said. ‘Something topographical perhaps. The land around it? Have you- Unless you’ve already done that?’

‘I’ve never done that,’ Ash said, staring at him. It would never occur to him to do that. He kind of hated his lake. Like, it was okay, his home there was okay, but it was just…

But he could map it, that’d be- He’d probably like it more as a result.

‘Augus would appreciate it as a gift, if you didn’t know what to do with it afterwards.’

That eagerness in Gwyn’s voice was endearing. A glimmer of genuine excitement that was childlike and helpful all at the same time. It was so fucking considerate, it hurt. It was also a surprisingly on point idea. It sought to solve a few things at once. Gwyn gave Ash something to do, gave him a way to bond better with his lake, gave him a gift idea for Augus.

It was almost scary. That he could do that.

_Fuck, it is scary. That’s just scary._

‘And I can do that here,’ Ash said slowly, looking around the room. ‘You would- You’d offer that to _me?’_

‘I don’t hate you,’ Gwyn said, covering his mouth as he yawned. He shook his head, as though irritated at the fact he was tired. Ash knew from Augus that Gwyn was tired _all the time._ ‘I didn’t know you liked cartography. I would have suggested it sooner.’

Ash needed a moment to understand what he was actually feeling. First, he realised it was so rare that people didn’t just _like_ him, that he didn’t quite know what to do with situations like this. Gwyn didn’t hate him, sure, but Gwyn didn’t trust him, he didn’t get excited when Ash walked into a room; things that Ash had been taking for granted all his life. It was kind of mind-boggling to realise he expected it, and that he behaved the way he did when he didn’t get it.

Something for the therapist, probably.

But also, Gwyn was like the opposite of that. From what Augus had said…he took for granted that people what, wouldn’t like him? Would just respect him as a War General or a King? His parents had hated him.

Even Ash had hated him.

Even _Augus,_ for a while, before he got to know Gwyn, had hated him. And Gulvi.

‘That’s- Maybe you could show me some stuff,’ Ash said carefully, watching closely while sounding casual. Sussing the situation out. ‘Could you? I don’t know anything about- And I’m kind of desperate at the moment for something to learn. I can’t go to the human world as much right now. But that might be too much time, so I’d understand…’

Gwyn didn’t look up at Ash straight away, but kept looking down. His cheeks were a little pink.

‘Just sometimes,’ Ash added.

‘I’d like that,’ Gwyn said quietly. He looked up and Ash couldn’t read the expression on his face. Shy? Confused? Hopeful? Whatever it was, Ash wasn’t sure he deserved that kind of regard, like what Ash asked for actually mattered. How could it matter? Gwyn was one of the most powerful people in the world. _Literally._

‘Me too,’ Ash said.

‘I could help you map your lake, if you like,’ Gwyn said.

‘Sure.’

Gwyn nodded, and then looked at the map he’d been working on. He still had paintbrushes in his hair. He still had that smudge of ink on his jaw.

‘Do you mind?’ Gwyn said then, without looking back at Ash. ‘Do you mind, if I keep the trows on you? A little longer.’

‘Sure,’ Ash said, deciding that it was about something more than Gwyn not trusting him. He didn’t really understand it, but he’d said his part, he didn’t feel as pissed off about it anymore. ‘You don’t have to ask.’

‘Next Tuesday evening,’ Gwyn said, still looking at his map. ‘I think it’s free.’

‘I’m free,’ Ash said quickly.

‘With the Winter Court-’

‘They honestly don’t need me there as much as I’m there,’ Ash said. ‘It just gives me something to do. Are you sure, though?’

‘Something might come up,’ Gwyn added, like Ash didn’t know that Gwyn lived in the Unseelie Court, was busy, and was King.

‘Or like a hundred things,’ Ash said, daring a grin.

Gwyn actually smiled back.

Ash’s heart was doing that fluttering thing that it did when he was close to landing a date for the night, when he’d gotten Augus a gift and Augus actually _loved_ it. Of all the things he’d expected from the evening, this hadn’t been it. He also found that he wanted to understand this side of Gwyn better. The side that didn’t lord his power over everyone else, who wasn’t cold and callous in the throne room, and clipping off orders and going to war. This side felt private, and different.

Ash wanted to protect it. He knew there was some irony in that, something…to laugh at later, bitterly, when he thought back over all the things he’d done. But now, in the moment, he just wanted to cultivate and protect it. Like the little plants on his balcony in his rooms.

‘So you’ll let me know a good time?’ Ash said, realising that it was his cue to leave. He stood, and Gwyn did the same, brushing at his shirt before making an uncertain eye contact.

‘Yes,’ Gwyn said.

‘Do I need to bring anything?’

‘No,’ Gwyn said. ‘I have- I have everything.’

‘Cool. Y’know, I think- I think Augus would really like that. A map of my lake. He’d love that way more than some of the other stuff I get him.’

Gwyn nodded, his expression beginning to close off, and Ash realised he needed to go, so Gwyn could process whatever had happened.

Ash stepped forwards and watched carefully as Gwyn tensed and then simply held still, not stepping back, not glaring. He grasped Gwyn’s shoulder – the one that wasn’t injured – and squeezed lightly.

‘Tuesday then. Cool, man, thanks for being so good about all of this. And so generous. I appreciate it. Like, a lot. Thank you.’

He made sure he had direct eye contact for that last part. Let Gwyn see that he meant it. Then he let go, and he walked out of the room, hearing Gwyn’s quiet goodbye as he closed the door behind him.

Ash walked back towards his rooms, thinking that maybe it was good he didn’t just gallivant off to the human world whenever he needed to escape these days. Maybe…it was good.


End file.
